Premium
An informational role of supermajority rules in monitoring the majority party's activities
Author(s) -
Kishishita Daiki
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
journal of public economic theory
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.809
H-Index - 32
eISSN - 1467-9779
pISSN - 1097-3923
DOI - 10.1111/jpet.12331
Subject(s) - misrepresentation , incentive , construct (python library) , economics , microeconomics , law and economics , law , political science , computer science , programming language
There often exists a supermajority rule that enables the minority party to delay or prevent a vote on a bill. I construct a two‐period model consisting of a representative voter, self‐interested parties, and a media outlet. In the model, the majority party has an incentive to misrepresent the voter's optimal policy. I show that the minority party's attempt to block a vote (e.g., a filibuster) can signal this misrepresentation. Interestingly, the key is that the minority party and the mass media are complementary in creating the signal. Overall, the results suggest that supermajority rules could be beneficial even for the majority of voters.